


Bird Calls

by levendis



Series: Prompt Fics [111]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Songfic, Unrequited Crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-03 14:41:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10969353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/levendis/pseuds/levendis
Summary: Nardole's in need of repair. This is not, he'd like to stress, a euphemism.





	Bird Calls

**Author's Note:**

> for Zabbers, who prompted: a Twelvedole in which Twelve can't avoid doing some maintenance on Nardole anymore

Everything was very much fine. Nardole’s body was rapidly dissolving into its component parts, but it was fine. He couldn’t walk great, and he fell down a bunch, but it was okay. Deal-with-able.

“You’re fucked,” the Doctor said. Sunglasses on, guitar slung around their waist. “You need seeing to. You need - knock ‘em down for me.”

“I need a doctor,” Nardole said dutifully.

“And the Doctor - ” The Doctor played a riff and let the feedback squawk. “Is in.”

Har har. “No. Not you.” He felt the rush of that statement building an angry blush up his neck.

The feedback petered out awkwardly. The Doctor flipped their sunglasses up, blinking at him. “Sorry?

Nardole with his Big Boy hat on, his Standing Up For Himself accessories. “It’s just that…”

“Spit it out.” The Doctor ditched their guitar entirely and pushed their sunglasses up further up into the broad nest of their hair.

“You were a bit rough, sir.” Bold move, Cotton.

The Doctor’s face scrunched up, in a ‘flipping through the mental Rolodex of ways they might have messed up’ sort of way. “Did I forget to turn off your sensors?”

“No, that’s not - it’s more the principle of the thing. Sir. Which is to say, uh. I mean, you - ”

“Have a terrible bedside manner,” they said, pleased at having solved the word puzzle. Sunglasses off and tucked carefully into their pocket.

Nardole nodded fervently. Not the right answer, but an answer, and an out. “The worst.”

“And here I thought I was providing a needed service. Fair enough.” For all they utterly, gleefully failed at nuanced social interaction, they did bristle quite a lot at having that pointed out.

Which is to say: the pout and storm-cloud eyebrows were out in full force. Nardole stood his ground. “I’d like a second opinion,” he said politely.

The Doctor drifted away, stepping behind their desk. “You do realize this leaves you in something of a conundrum,” they said, sitting down and kicking their legs up onto the cushioning pile of unread essays.

Right. That part. “No one on Earth this year can fix a cyborg.”

“Few in all of time and space are qualified to maintain your, uh.”

Nonsense. Complete fuckery. Cack-handed DIY repair job. The sentient version of the car from that one Johnny Cash song.

“Unique attributes,” the Doctor finished weakly. “So not only would we need to abandon the Vault, and our Oath, we would need to go gallivanting off in search of someone with all of my knowledge but who also, most importantly, is kind, gentle, and reassuring in a way I evidently am not.” ‘Gallivanting off’ accompanied by hand gestures sketching out how’d they go, just go, movement on the syllable.

That was a hell of a sentence to unpack; Nardole did his best. “Are you blackmailing me?”

“I’m using your own logic and tediously frequent guilt trip against you. Huge difference.” The Doctor leaned dangerously far back in their chair, clearly very pleased with themself.

Nardole’s right leg took this opportunity to release a series of washers and bolts that rolled away from him with a cavalier, defiant air. “Touche.”

“So make a choice,” the Doctor said. They swung awkwardly forward, front legs of the chair slamming back down on the ground. “Both choices are bad. You still have to choose.”

Nardole again regretted, for the millionth time, the very long chain of bad decisions that had brought him to this point.

 

* * *

He couldn’t leave the vault. He certainly wouldn’t ask the Doctor to leave the vault. So: they stayed here. Also: this was happening.

_Where would be best?_ the Doctor had asked. Here was fine, he supposed, in the office. The Doctor grumbled and disappeared into the TARDIS for an hour, reappearing with a box filled with truly terrifying implements and two packets of prawn-flavored crisps and a large, unwieldy, unsettlingly-shaped pillow.

_Would you like to listen to music, or perhaps watch a film?_ the Doctor had asked. Maybe some jazz, yeah, sure. _Mingus Ah Um_ on the record player, the needle dropped. Nardole laid down on the sofa and tried to figure out how he was supposed to fit around the pillow, and whether he was getting it wrong or if he was just the wrong shape.

_Tell me if anything feels uncomfortable or unpleasant or wrong,_ the Doctor said.

“The fact that you’re trying so hard is almost making it worse,” Nardole replied, snapping back into the here-and-now.

The Doctor looked up from behind their desk, still rearranging their torture devices/DIY carpentry tools into some inexplicable order. “What is it that you want from me, Nardole.”

Oh, what a loaded question. Said in an altogether too husky voice. Nardole swallowed hard and clutched at the pillow. “Just get it over with.”

“Goodbye Pork Pie Hat” started playing. The Doctor approached, hands empty. Nardole thought about, what if: a black hole came by somehow and swallowed him up.

“Okay,” the Doctor said softly. “Yeah. Right. I’m gonna - you’ll need less trousers for this.”

Nardole waved at his panic from a safe distance and screwed his eyes shut and shimmied out of his trousers, or at least as far out he could considering he still had his shoes on. This was incredibly undignified. This was - other things, also, maybe.

“All sensors off? Or just pain receptors.”

‘All’ would be the sensible choice, the ‘this is just a normal routine thing and not anything weird’ response. So he squirmed and stammered out ‘Just the, uh. Just the - the p-. The pain. Thanks.“ He listened to the sonic screwdriver whirr. “Boogie Stop Shuffle” started playing. All these bad decisions in a row.

The Doctor’s hand light on his thigh, squeezing slightly. They retreated, came back with a rattling, half-dropped handful of Things. Nardole clenched harder at the pillow. “Self-Portrait in Three Colors”, now. (This had been one of his favorite human musical works, and now it was ruined.)

 

* * *

“Okay?” the Doctor asked, while doing something unthinkable with the skin-bits and the padding and then the inner workings of Nardole.

Next track. “Turn it off, please. Sir.”

A break, a pause, where Nardole refused to relax in favor of sweating profusely, and the needle scratched off the record. So. Silence, now. Just his own poorly-regulated breathing and the rustle of the Doctor returning.

“This is the worst possible time to ask this, which I’ve found generally is the best time to get an honest answer. Was it really just my brusqueness that bothered you?”

“As opposed to what,” Nardole ground out. The Doctor was fairly deep inside him now, tugging out wires and soldering them back.

“I’m dumb, I’m not _that_ dumb. I’ve seen how you look at me.”

“Like what,” Nardole said. Mindless repetition was the best-case scenario here.

The Doctor gently but firmly tugged something home. “Don’t make me say it,” they replied.

Like it was something shameful and wrong, something barely thinkable, embarrassing. Funny old Nardole with a funny old crush, ha ha. Inappropriate reactions to any intimacy after half a century as a celibate cyborg, ha ha ha ha. He curled harder around the pillow.

“Just tying you back up now,” the Doctor said flatly. Which they did, presumably, going by the noises and the odd tugging feelings.

And then it was done. And their hand was still on his thigh.

“Not so bad, was it now,” the Doctor said. Squeezing gently.

Nardole thought about what if: he could ascend to the astral plane and leave this universe entirely. “No,” he squeaked.

The Doctor’s hand slid up a fraction of an inch, towards where Nardole was plainly and unfortunately clad in a well-worn pair of pants. “I’ve been here before. And I can - if you want. D'you want?”

Well, yes, but.

“No,” Nardole squeaked again, more firmly this time. Yes, but no. Not like this. It’s complicated.

The Doctor withdrew their hand, and then the rest of themself. They spun the record and set the needle back down, in the middle of “Fables of Faubus”. Put all the bits back in the box, and opened the two bags of crisps; they handed one to Nardole, and poured theirs down their throat. “Just let me know,” they said, mouth full and spewing crumbs.

Nardole detached himself from the pillow, pulled himself to standing. Things seemed okay, down there. The relevant things. The standing-up things. “Thanks,” he said.

“Seriously, though. If you want, yanno. I’m not - ”

“Please stop there,” Nardole snapped. He tugged his trousers back on, once again cursing the general lack of foresight in re: his android body and both it not quite fitting his clothing and, considering all of time and space, his clothing not quite fitting his android body. If he had to be half a robot, surely the upshot should be not having to suck in to get his trousers buttoned.

“But thanks,” he amended. Coulda been worse. Coulda been better, but coulda been worse.

The Doctor wriggled their eyebrows in an unfortunately suggestive fashion. Nardole sighed, testing out his newly-functional limb. No screws loose. “Pussy Cat Dues”, now. He grinned convincingly to the no one looking as the Doctor packed up their tools and crisp wrappers and the baffling pillow-thing into the box.

And the Doctor left, back into the TARDIS, with a loaded glance and silent for once. Like _what_ and _where_ and _how_?

A whole raft of bad decisions; up to him, apparently, to choose which if any. He followed the Doctor into the TARDIS.


End file.
